Does an older person need life cover? Surely, they have no dependants needing the lump sum as they should have taken steps to provide for their retirement, assuming they are no longer fit to continue work.

Income Protection - This benefit continues a proportion of salary until “normal retirement age” when the pension would “kick in”. As with death benefits, we have morbidity rather than mortality, but again it increases with age. The question is when does the benefit stop, when they die? No insurer is going to offer that kind of open-ended risk.

Private medical insurance - insurers rate people based on age, if we are unable to retire people, we could end up with firms paying for staff suffering from senile dementia. National Insurance contributions were designed to pay for the NHS and pensions, thus every person who is provided with medical insurance is paying twice, once to the insurer and once to the government through taxes. If employers cancel the benefit because of cost, the burden will fall on the NHS. Could it cope with the added expenditure?

Many benefits are provided by employers for the benefit of staff, some employees would not think to protect a young family from the effect of their sudden death, or injury, others because of their health would find cover, if available, expensive. Insurers when considering groups of people average out all the factors, but a few aged employees can put costs up when employers want to reduce them.

Yes, we have a skill shortage and need aged people to work, but no one prevented an employer keeping an employee on if they both wanted it. But this legislation removes an employer’s choice.

Unless there is an explosion of jobs available, every old person employed prevents a young person from getting a job, sociologists are saying we need to get 18-21 year olds into work as soon as possible as failure destroys their self esteem. Today’s figures for Not in Employment Education or Training, show an increase, this is not good for them or us as taxpayers.

Forcing employers to provide identical benefits for all could result in jobs moving abroad where health and safety requirements are lower, and benefits reduced, thus increasing unemployment. Or, employers cancel all fringe benefits, leaving people unprotected.

Prior to age discrimination becoming law, many firms kept old people on, they were useful, sometimes because of the lack of fringe benefits they were cheap labour, their higher sick rates compensated by the reduced cost of employment. Now these people are an expense firms could do without.
Laurence J Power
www.powerimage.co.uk